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Never ever take your kids to Mount Rainier National Park
About three weeks ago, I drove my son out to a national park for a little weekend camping trip. We took the 410 out from Tacoma into Mount Rainier, a place my own dad used to take me when I was a kid. I wanted my son, David, who’s two and a half, to find the same joy of the wilderness as I had, but I’m quite convinced that he will be terrified of forests for the rest of his life. When we arrived that Friday, the weather was crisp and the first signs of spring had finally made themselves known. We walked (or rather, I walked with David on my shoulders) for about two, maybe three hours from the parking lot into a small, desolate camping ground with a pre-made fire pit. I’m not a very overprotective parent, so I let David wobble around a bit while I pitched the tent. Just as I was about done and was getting ready to unload our three-day supply into the tent, I heard David make some sounds from behind me. Now, I recognized these sounds immediately, as they are the sounds he usually makes when he’s excited about something. I turned around and saw him sitting in the grass, about twenty feet away, staring into the woods. More strangely, he was doing this thing he does when he’s particularly excited about something, in which he’s slapping both of his thighs repeatedly. I slowly walked over while trying to keep an eye on both him and the woods at the same time, but there was nothing in the treeline I could make out. When I was finally by his side, I asked him what he had seen, and at this his response was: "Monkeyman, monkeyman!" He was smiling, still slapping his thighs, and as much as I tried to match his excitement like a good parent should do, suddenly, the serenity of the woods was replaced by a sense of unease. I fixed my eyes on the treeline and peered in very, very carefully. It was just such an incredibly strange thing for him to say. I picked David up, not wanting to leave him alone anymore, at least until I could regain some clarity, and walked into the treeline. I don’t know how many of you are parents, but the last thing you want to do when you’re taking your kid out for a fun weekend is frighten him. I mention this because the sensible thing might have been to hush him, to tell him to keep quiet for a while, but then, I also knew that realistically, this was just an imaginative manifestation. After a few minutes of scouting around with David up on my shoulders, I decided to return to camp. It was about 3:30 I believe, and so I made us some lunch, still keeping an occasional eye on the space at which David had been clapping and yapping just a few minutes before. As much as I tried to forget it, I just couldn’t. I’m not superstitious. I don’t believe in aliens, ghosts or bigfoots. But I suppose my parental instinct was simply in too much of a high gear for me to let go, so as the cold sun was setting, I decided to ask David a bit about what he had seen. To understand my story a little better, it might be relevant to mention here that David has a mild learning disability, which has particularly impaired his speech. He can understand fine, but his ability to communicate has lagged behind somewhat. As I was getting the fire going, I asked him about the monkeyman. I asked if it was a big monkeyman. David thought about that for a second. He then laughed and nodded. I then asked if it seemed like a nice monkeyman, and David once again giggled in approval. I wasn’t really sure what else to ask. Nightfall struck, and on full bellies, I read a chapter from a book to him as he fell asleep in his sleeping bag. When I fell asleep myself, I had almost forgotten about monkeyman. I awoke in pitch darkness. The fire pit was out. I reached out to feel for David and panic struck me hard. He wasn’t in the tent anymore. With only my underwear on, I stormed out, but realized it was too dark to see anything, so I dropped back into the tent and tore my flashlight out of my bag. I was screaming his name all at the same time. With only the weak beam of a flashlight I didn’t think I would ever have to actually rely on, I shone it around in circles, still calling for David. For some reason, I ran towards the spot at which David had been so transfixed in the daytime. I shouted his name into the trees. As I trotted inwards into the pitch black woods, I was too frantic to notice how badly my feet were getting scraped up by the bark and stone. After only about a minute of walking, I saw something that made me drop the flashlight and bolt forward. David was standing there, peering into the darkness, utterly still. I grabbed onto him, hard, and began to sob. Still clutching him tightly, I picked up the flashlight again, which had been idly beaming the ground, and scouted around, fending off the darkness. I could see nothing around. As I carried him back, looking over my shoulder, I asked what had happened. He implied that he didn’t know, and that he was tired. David has had a long history of sleep walking. That night, I locked up the tent from the inside with a padlock. I only got about three hours of good rest. David slept like a rock, despite my trembling embrace. The following morning, I cooked some eggs and bacon on the camping stove. David had no recollection of what had happened, and seemed content to continue the trip. I thought it would be incautious to shrug off last night’s event as mere sleepwalking, especially considering the "monkeyman"-business, but also thought it would be a bit too silly to cancel the entire trip over it. Thus, I made a promise to myself that if anything else were to happen, we would drive back to Tacoma at a moment’s notice. The rest of the day was actually quite nice and helped me take my mind off of things. David was at first a little upset at not having the iPad, but eventually discovered that nature can be just as cool as pixels. We made some bark boats with faces on them and set them downstream, watched squirrels and listened to the birds. It was everything I had hoped the trip would be. At dusk, when the trees stretched long shadows across the grass, David was getting too cold and too tired to play anymore, so I decided we would spend the rest of the day in the tent. I had brought along this game where you have to trace the outline of a person with an electrode, and if your aim is off, it makes a funny sound. I don’t remember what it’s called, but David found it hilarious. It’s dumb, but supposedly helps with motor development. At one of David’s turns, he made an error and the little speaker made the sound again, and David bellowed into laughter. What happened next filled me with a sense of fear that I doubt anything will ever match. From about 150 feet away, I heard the exact same laugh that David had made, only that it was much deeper. It was almost like when you record yourself speaking, then digitally pitch it down. I froze, and this time, I couldn’t hide my reaction from David. I could tell by his face that he had heard it too. I lifted a finger up to my lips to communicate him that we needed to be quiet. It was at this moment that I also noticed that the sun had set completely. I also noticed just how dead quiet the woods were. Every second felt like an eternal minute as we sat there in the tent, absolutely still, enveloped in the silence. When the sound of my own heartbeat in my ears finally ceased a little, I slowly leaned over towards my backpack to get my handgun out. When I turned around to face David again, I saw that he had picked up the electrode again. I sternly removed it from his hand and whispered with equal sternness, "not now, David." Then, just as I had said it, a low, broken voice whispered from literally inches from the tent: "Not now, David." The next thing I’m aware off is that I’m shooting wildly through the fabric of the tent in the direction the sound. David is screaming. And as the gunshots ring throughout the woods, I hear the last remnants of something sprinting away. With my hand violently trembling, I opened the padlock and jumped out with a flashlight in my left hand, aiming the faint beam into black nothingness. I grabbed David, stuffed everything within arm’s reach into the backpack, and ran. The way back was pure terror. There was not a second at which I did not feel as if something was right behind us, ready to leap out from behind us or the side of the trail, out from the darkness. The only thing I could say to David was "it’s okay, you’ll get the iPad soon. Do you want the iPad?" Nothing ever leaped out at us, nor did I hear anything except for the rushing of the wind and the occasional running stream by the trailside. I was so out of it that even in the car, I kept checking the backseat just to see if there was something sitting in it, ready to destroy us. I don’t know how to explain to David’s pediatrician what happened in Mount Rainier. I haven’t even told his mother the full story, only that I thought someone came up to our tent and that I fired a warning shot. Needless to say, David hasn’t been the same since. He has been getting constant headaches, which might be from damage to his ears by the gunshot. I don’t really know how to end the story, but one thing is for certain. Never, ever take your kids out to Mount Rainier National Park. Category:Fanfic Category:Creepypasta